Review of The Velvet Touch

Seldom is it possible to find three unusual elements in the same film; these three I claim are a brilliant part for a female lead, an absorbing and tense duel between heroine and pursuer, and an ethically satisfying excuse for murder. I claim that "The Velvet Touch" presents all three elements quite successfully. It is a very well-directed film, set in theaters, interior rooms and apartments; and I suggest it has one of the simplest story lines of any first-rate film. An actress has been groomed by her mentor-agent-Svengali and has become Broadway's leading comedic star. He wants her to do a new comedy, after her most recent triumph; she wants to do a dramatic play. They quarrel; he threatens to run her reputation, her career, her life, and in a moment of fear an loathing she kills him with a blunt instrument. The remainder of the film consists of the actress's preparation for an achievement of the dramatic triumph she had thought but not been certain she could earn to, even while she is being pursued by a portly and wise police inspector who after her opening night success, which he allows her to complete, escorts her to what the viewer knows will be a trial for murder of some sort. Of course there is a new fiancée, and a woman falsely accused connected with the deceased, but essentially that is the entire storyline. What this narrative does not convey however is the skill with which Sydney Greenstreet plays the deferential but brilliant detective; nor does it hint at the possibilities of the main part, played in this film by Rosalind Russell who brings out many of those potentials. Powerful Leo Genn plays the fiancée, Claire Trevor the other woman suspected of murder and Leon Ames the despicable murder victim. Others in the cast include Frank McHugh, Walter Kingsford, Dan Tobin, Nydia Westman, Bill Erwin and Martha Hyer, among others. The director of the film, Jack Gage, handled the entire project very well; his blocking and photographing of interior scenes makes the action flowq dramatically, and never seemed "staged". Then there are other technical contributions and subordinate creations: Travis Banton's gowns; cinematography by Joseph Walker, set decorations by Darrell Silvera and Maurice Yates and music by Leigh Harline. Miss Russell produced this film for herself with her husband, and she comes close to making it work perfectly in my view. The part, in my judgment as a writer, cannot be "played"; it requires charisma, highly-trained Shakespearean ability in comedy and the equal ability to perform drama; perhaps one actor in a hundred could even approach such a combination. The mood of the piece is somber, the lighting subdued, the B/W photography dense and well-lighted at the same time. This is a very interesting and moving work throughout; we know Valerie did not mean to kill the tyrannical business partner who wanted do dominate her; but her desire to prove that she had been right about playing this dramatic part she had chosen becomes the viewer's importance as well. She is willing to confess to save an innocent accusee; but the play's the thing in "The Velvet Touch". And that she succeeds vindicates her judgment doubly--that the man trying to ruin her life had been wrong and that his brutal manners and lack of ethics were not desperation to save her at all but something far more sinister. A stirring ending caps off a memorable motion picture as Valeris and the Captain of detectives walk from the theater like royalty, not like those involved in a murder.